(AFP) – The Kennedy Center on Monday dropped US President Donald Trump’s name from the website of the performing arts venue. The building in the nation’s capital that houses the Kennedy Center continues, however, to display Trump’s name on its facade for the time being. A federal judge ruled last month that the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts had been illegally renamed after Trump and that his name must be taken down.
A furious Trump reacted by saying he was giving up control of the venue, which he seized at the start of his second term last year by naming himself chairman. In December, the center’s governing board, which Trump stacked with his allies, voted to rename itself the “Trump Kennedy Center” and the Republican president’s name was added to the facade in large letters above that of Kennedy. The center’s website had also featured Trump’s name alongside that of Kennedy, but that was no longer the case on Monday.
Judge Christopher Cooper, in his May 29 ruling, said only Congress has the right to change the center’s name and gave the administration 14 days to remove Trump’s name from the facade and any materials linked to the venue. Cooper also issued a temporary block on Trump’s demand to close the Kennedy Center for two years of renovations, which was due to start in July.
Trump lashed out at the judge and said he was washing his hands of the “dying” venue. “Unless I am free to do what I do better than anyone else, bring this Institution back, physically, financially, and artistically, I have no interest in continuing what could only be a hopeless journey into ‘NEVER NEVER LAND,'” he said on Truth Social.
Since returning to the White House, Trump has taken repeated measures to put his name and image in official spaces — an abrupt break with US political tradition. The disbanded US Institute of Peace has been renamed after Trump and his face stares down from huge banners outside the Department of Justice and Department of Agriculture. The Trump administration is also seeking to have his image on a $250 bill to celebrate the country’s 250th anniversary of the declaration of independence from Britain.
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